“CC, do you still own CDs?” He didn’t even say hello. He just cut straight to the chase.
“Yeah. Why?”
“Thank God I have a daughter who is technologically challenged.”
“Excuse me?”
“You know what I mean. Do you have Nirvana’s Nevermind?”
“I just figured it out, too,” I said as I hurried across the room to my entertainment center.
I had a fairly small collection of CDs. I’d gotten rid of most of them when I’d moved. I kept only a few: Black Shadow, Madonna, Nirvana, Metallica, Garth Brooks, Stone Temple Pilots, Led Zeppelin, and Jimi Hendrix.
I flipped through the discs with shaking hands until I found Nirvana.
Nevermind. The familiar cover of a baby underwater with a dollar bill floating next to it stared me in the face.
It was a really odd cover, I briefly thought, and then I opened the case.
Inside was the actual Nevermind CD. I felt my chest heave in disappointment. I’d really thought I would find something in there.
And then, as if some supernatural force was at work, the disc fell out. Behind Nevermind was a DVD. It had no writing on it, nothing to make it recognizable in any way.
“Dad, there’s a DVD in here!”
“CC, stay right where you are. I’m on my way over with George.”
I wanted to know what the hell was on the DVD. Clearly it was something Damien had left for me. It had to have something on it that he wanted me to see in the event of his death.
My entire body trembled with nerves as I waited for the longest fifteen minutes of my life to pass. I paced back and forth across my living room, never setting the DVD down.
And then my dad walked through my front door with George trailing close behind. My dad pulled me into a tight embrace while George closed my door. He didn’t say anything, but his arms were comforting all the same. He was tense.
A bag was slung over George’s shoulder, and he went to my kitchen table, where a disaster of crumpled up papers and half-started attempts at vows littered the area.
I ran over and cleared a space while George pulled a laptop out of his bag.
“The DVD?” he asked formally. No greeting from him, either.
He sat in front of the laptop while it fired up, and I handed him the DVD. It was the first time it had left my hands since I’d discovered it.
My dad and I stood behind George. My dad’s arm was tight around my shoulders, his fingers digging into the skin of my arm. I knew if I looked over, his knuckles would be white.
Not one of us in that room knew exactly what to expect, and the tension hung heavy in the air between us.
The laptop seemed to be state of the art, and it recognized the DVD quickly. A folder popped open. There were several PDF files and a MOV file. The MOV was titled “Watch First.”
George clicked the icon, and a moment later, Damien filled the screen.
It was the same Damien who had left me over a year earlier.
His face was bruised and bloody. His left eye wouldn’t open under the shiner just below his eyebrow. His nose was broken, and his eyes were red-rimmed and watery. I couldn’t tell if they were watery from emotions, tears, or something else.
When he started speaking, though, it was clear that it was from his emotions.
George turned up the volume.
“Where do I even start?” he asked.
It was surreal watching this video of Damien from beyond the grave.
“I need to find a way to say goodbye.”
His voice cracked, and he paused and wiped his good eye.
“Roxy, I’m leaving because I love you. This isn’t just what’s best for you or for us. This is what I have to do because you’ve been threatened. And because of that, I’m doing what I have to in order to protect you.”
I glanced over at my dad. His eyes were trained on the screen, his mouth set tight and his eyes hard. His strong jaw covered in stubble worked back and forth. He looked like he’d lost someone he cared about greatly, and it hurt to watch him like that.
“This is between Randy and me. I’m the one who got myself into this mess, and the only choice I have is to keep you safe. I’m going to put everything that you need onto this DVD in case you ever need it. I have no idea what’s in front of us, but I know that I need to let you live your life. I have records of every transaction I’ve ever had with Randy. I have additional video footage, too. I’m going to leave another copy of this DVD in a safe deposit box. At some point, I’ll get the key to your father, and I’ll mail the bank and the box number to my parents separately. Use whatever you need. I just ask that you keep yourself safe, because I love you. You’re my best friend. Keep everything we have in your heart and move forward. Run forward. Live your life. Love. Love harder and love stronger than what we ever had, because you deserve it.”
He stood and shut off the video recording.
The three of us stared at the screen for a moment.
“What are the other files?” I finally asked, voicing what was in my head while breaking the silence.
George clicked one open.
It looked like an email, and I stared at it as I tried to figure out what the hell it was saying. The body of the email was Damien’s message to Randy.
I’ll take $5K on the Cowboys for this weekend.
Gambling. I’d already known that, and I wasn’t thinking clearly enough to put the pieces together. I couldn’t figure out why I would need this.
Thank God for my dad and George.
“Holy shit,” my dad murmured. “It’s all here.”
“This is what they were looking for,” George interjected.
My dad nodded. He backed away from the computer and paced a few steps, rubbing the palm of his hand down his face.
“What’s going on?” I asked.
My dad stopped pacing and rested his hands on the back of the chair in front of him. He leaned forward, using the chair to support his weight.
He spoke to George, not to me. “It’s time to tell her.”
twenty-three
I was finally going to get the information I felt had been needlessly hidden from me. Inside I felt some combination of nervous and sick, but I also felt some measure of relief. I deserved to know this if it concerned me. Damien had thought ahead to ensure that I’d get the information if he died, so it was only right that my dad fill me in on the missing pieces.
My dad took a deep breath. “CC, something happened a few nights before Damien left.” He opened his mouth to continue when a noise silenced him.
We all heard the key slide into the keyhole on my front door in the silence of the room. The door opened, and three heads swung toward it.
The smile on Parker’s face faded as he saw the anxiety and tension of the scene in front of him.
“What’s going on?” he asked. The glee around his eyes from a night out with his buddies changed to unease. His loose body became rigid in his black jeans and black shirt. He shut and locked the door behind him.
My dad nodded at George. “He should know, too.”
George nodded his approval, which I found interesting considering it was my dad who was clearly in charge.
Parker came over to us, slinging his arm around my shoulders. He planted a soft kiss on my lips, the kind that caused my heart to flutter in my chest.
“You want to sit?” my dad asked.
I nodded, and the three of us moved into my family room. Parker and I sat side by side on the couch while my dad sat in my favorite reading chair. George sat at my table, clicking the mouse furiously as he read through the documents on the DVD.
My dad rested his elbows on his knees. He folded his hands in front of him and leaned forward earnestly. He was wearing a white t-shirt, and it set off the blue in his eyes. He looked intensely at the two of us for a moment before he started talking. “A few nights before D left, Randy beat the shit out of him. He owed Randy a lot of money. I took care of the debt, but D threatened Randy. He said he’d go to the cops. In hindsight, I’m pretty sure that threat was what ultimately ended Damien’s life.”